Harley Greenoak

“ Something of a murmur stirred the group of men who had stopped to look.
“By Jove, old chap, you must be a bit off colour to-day,” cried Dick Selmes. Harley Greenoak to miss—to miss anything—however small and at whatever distance, why, that was an eye-opener to him, and, incidentally, to more than one other. Harley Greenoak—to have “his eye wiped,” and by a young Police sub-inspector! Why, it was marvellous.
“A bad workman finds fault with his tools,” said Greenoak, musingly, as he eyed the weapon, and balanced it critically. “Well, I may be a bad workman, but this is a tool I’m not used to. ”

“ Harley Greenoak, pacing his horse up the valley, noted the fact, and—read it at its real meaning. And its real meaning did not augur well either for the situation or for his self-imposed mission by which he had hoped to improve the latter. But little time was to be his for tranquil reflection, for there was a savage rush of dogs from two of the clusters of huts he was passing at a hundred yards or so, and a tumultuous snapping and snarling round his horse’s heels. ”

“ For the first time Harley Greenoak felt a thrill of superstitious misgiving as unpleasant as it was strange. He to miss, and to miss at that short distance, with a charge of buckshot too—for he had fired the smooth-bore barrel—why, it was incredible! Nothing human could have escaped. ”

“ Harley Greenoak sat smoking a pipe in the one living-room of the Commandant’s modest little bungalow. It was night. The only other occupant of the room was its owner; and he was moving tranquilly about arranging his “specimens,” dividing his attention about evenly between these and the subject of conversation. Yet the latter was weighty with the issues of life and death.
“If things go as you say, Greenoak,” he was observing, “we haven’t a man too many; either here, or over the Kei, or indeed along the whole frontier. ”

“ The ejaculation, quick and eager; a sudden intensity wherewith the answer had been received was not lost on Harley Greenoak. As we heard him tell the Commandant, he was here to feel the pulse of the people. Already he had got his finger upon it.
“The people are mad, son of the Great Chief,” he went on. “Mad—quite mad. The people here.”
Matanzima laughed—and it struck his hearer there was a note of great relief in the tone.
“Why, as to that, Kulondeka,” he said, “they are only a little excited. They are all young men, those out yonder. They have been dancing all night, and have not worn it off. ”

“ There was a fine roll on, and every now and then the nose of the liner dipped deep into the green water, throwing up a seething splash of milky spume.
“Because,” answered Sir Anson, “I know something of men, although my experience has been gained in a side of life totally different from your own. Apart from that, does it occur to you that you may not be entirely unknown to some of the passengers, and even, by repute, to the ship’s officers? What if I may have heard it said, more than once, that Harley Greenoak’s name is better than most men’s witnessed signature?” ”

“ Tyala.
There followed a moment of tense silence. Then a fresh hubbub arose on the outskirts of the crowd, quite a number of which broke away, and made for the lower end of the building. Harley Greenoak and MacFennel’s assistant looked at each other. Both had caught the proposed new move.
“I’ll take care of this, Mr Greenoak,” said the latter, a rough and ready, powerful young fellow who understood the Kafirs and their language as one of themselves. “Burn the house, will they? We shall see.” ”

“ I’m only a plain man, Miss Brandon. I don’t know that I ever had much education, but I’ve always held a theory of my own that every one is put into the world to be of some use, and I’ve always tried to act up to it.”
“Haven’t you just, and succeeded too? I suppose all South Africa knows that.”
The soft-voiced flattery, the glance that accompanied it, were calculated to stir the pulses of even so strong a man as Harley Greenoak, and this he himself realised while striving to neutralise their effect. ”

“ Why, he must be old enough to be her father, concluded Dick, in his inexperience rather consoling himself with the thought.
“Yes, you told me that,” rejoined Hazel. “But you are only one of many. Harley Greenoak has the reputation of having saved countless lives and got no end of people out of difficulties of one kind or another, yet he never talks about it, they say. ”

“ He had seen what execution its wielder could do, wherefore he pulled up sharp. Kafirs are sworn dog fanciers, and not infrequently have more affection for their dogs than their children; but this particular one had still more affection for his life, wherefore he halted. Then both knew that the situation was saved.
Slowly, warily, they rode on—on, not back; for Dick bore well in mind Harley Greenoak’s precept, never to let savages think you are afraid of them; the Kafirs hurling after them all manner of jeering abuse, which it was quite as well that Hazel, at any rate, did not understand. ”

“ Greenoak told him, and just then Dick returned.
“Faugh!” he exclaimed. “Those chaps are a bit ‘strong’ when you get too near them.”
“Yes, stale grease and red clay don’t make a fragrant combination,” laughed Harley Greenoak. “I hope you can get us some dinner directly, MacFennel; for I can tell you we both feel like it.”
“Yes, it’s ready now. Come on in. Bring the shooters inside. It isn’t safe to leave them in the cart with all these loafers about.” ”

“ Upon the stoep several figures were now standing, and prominent among them the tall form of Dick Selmes. Harley Greenoak, whose feeling of relief was certainly not inferior to that of the others, shook a disapproving head.
“We want to bring this off quietly,” he said. “We don’t want to let the whole Gaika nation know we’re here, and that’s about what all this hullabaloo is likely to effect.”
“It’s all right, old chap. We’ll give ’em fits if they give us the chance,” said one man, airily. Him Greenoak at once set down as a fool. ”

“ He certainly has an amazing aptitude for getting into holes, but then he manages to get himself out again.” (“Or you do it for him, old chap,” interrupted Dick.) “Well, then, as you have coupled your toast with the name of Harley Greenoak, I reply by proposing another toast, and that is ‘Harley Greenoak’s Charge.’”
“Here, Dick,” said Sir Anson, “open another bottle or so, and give the men a brimming bumper apiece. They must drink this toast too. ”

“ The girl wasn’t born who would not think the better of him for having borne a man’s share in active events, and so he would find when he met her again, and more to the same effect. All of which was vastly comforting to Dick, who would turn in with the last impression that if any fellow were found bold enough to tell him that this world could contain a better chap than Harley Greenoak, why, he would take infinite pleasure in calling that man a liar.
A day or two later two express-riders, dusty and fagged with hard riding, arrived in camp with despatches. ”

“ Inspector Chambers was an officer of promptitude and decision, and on Harley Greenoak waking him up in the grey of dawn with the news that Dick Selmes was nowhere in the camp, the sentries of the night before were at once called to account, and the truth came out. The young gentleman was not one of themselves, explained the defaulter, who supposed, therefore, that he was not under the same orders. Ordering the man to be put under arrest, the Inspector gave his directions, and in a surprisingly short space of time nearly the whole troop was mounted and heading at a trot for Vunisa’s location. ”

“ Otherwise the jackals and wild dogs’ll mangle it out of all recognition before morning.”
Dick readily agreed, and the two, collecting some dry wood, soon had a roaring fire under way.
“Why, this is your first camp, Dick,” said Greenoak, reaching out a handful of tobacco for him to fill from, and then filling up himself.
“Rather,” was the answer. “Oh, it’s glorious—glorious,” jumping up again to go and look at the mighty beast, lying there but a few yards off in the moonlight. Harley Greenoak laughed.
“He’s all right. He won’t run away,” he said. ”

“ He was no end of a jolly old chap, and he, Dick, wouldn’t offend him for the world. And then Haakdoornfontein was no end of a jolly place, with a different shoot, by Jingo, for every day in the year. And Greenoak had laughed drily, as he reflected that his charge’s enthusiasm for that form of sport had flagged perceptibly of late. But like a wise man and a tactful one he had known better than to push the suggestion further. Things must just take their course, he decided. A matter of this kind was a delicate one, and one in which the man most concerned must judge for himself. ”

“ He’s usually grim.”
“I think him a dear old chap,” said Dick, decisively. “Such a character too. Well, I’m jolly glad he didn’t take me at my word,” with a meaning look at the sweet sparkling face beside him; which look the owner of the said face chose utterly to ignore. But from the foregoing dialogue it is obvious that Harley Greenoak’s suspicions as to his host’s complicity in any possible complications with regard to his charge were without foundation in fact.
“I shouldn’t be surprised if Mr Greenoak was right, and that Uncle Eph did get him up here to clear up the mystery,” said Hazel. ”

“ His gun’ll get rusty if he don’t mind,” chuckled the old man, reaching a handful of tobacco out of his pocket and cramming his pipe.
“The young folks seem to have cottoned to each other,” he went on, between puns. The other had no need to follow the glance—for “the young folks” aforesaid had been visible to him for some time away down the kloof, and the sight, even before his companion’s remark, had set Harley Greenoak thinking. ”

“ This was no white man’s business, they roared. Let the white men interfere and they would kill the lot. All of which, of course, Dick Selmes, for his part, did not understand one word. But Harley Greenoak did.
Quickly he called out to them in their own tongue, urging that it was not worth while their losing many lives for the sake of one, which in all probability was already gone; that they themselves were well armed, and that Dick Selmes would certainly never be frightened into giving way; and further, that the sound of firing would be sure to bring the Mounted Police down upon them. ”

“ And this was scarcely wonderful, seeing that he was the father of Nzinto, the man whom Harley Greenoak had just shot dead. The fact that the deceased had brought his fate upon his own head did not count for much towards mending matters.
“The people might as well lie down again,” he was saying, continuing the debate, which had already reached a heated pitch. “‘It is not healthy to attempt to snatch a gun from the hand of Kulondeka,’” he quoted, with a sneer. “Hau! Had I been there then, Kulondeka would have found it ‘not healthy’ to shoot down the children of Gaika, here in their own home. ”

“ Harley Greenoak held aloof.
“Who’s on guard at the back, Dick?” he said drily, when he could get in a word.
“At the back? Oh, we don’t want a guard now, old chap,” was the airy response. “We’ve beat ’em off, made ’em run like so many curs. It was the rockets did it, and the rockets were Mrs Waybridge’s idea. ”

“ Then, enter a bright, pretty, taking girl, who makes the rough places, as by magic, smooth, imports the refinement to which his charge has been accustomed, with one sweep of the wand, and whose personality is in itself a supplement to the sunshine. No contrast could be more strongly marked. Assuredly if Hesketh had of his own intuition brought off such a dramatic stroke, why, Hesketh was more of a genius than the acquaintance of that rugged old recluse would have given him credit for being. But this reflection did not tend to lighten Harley Greenoak’s private disquietude. ”

“ About half a field off our friend Dick was converging on the rendezvous, with the keepers and dogs, apparently engaged in animated converse with the former.
“Oh, as to that, Sir Anson, you couldn’t miss a bird with a gun like this,” was the modest reply; the gun being, in fact, one of a valuable pair which had been sprung upon Harley Greenoak as a surprise present from Dick and his father conjointly.
“And as to that,” rejoined the latter, “there are a good many men who’d miss a good many birds with a gun like that or any other. But how things shape themselves. ”

“ Harley Greenoak was not sorry to exchange the riot and racket outside for the cool interior of the young chief’s hut. The latter was by no means as neat and clean as he had been wont to find in similar dwellings among the Zulus; because the Xosa has a sort of passion for grease—and dogs. ”

“ He had proved useful enough already, and might prove so again, thought Inspector Chambers when the man expressed a desire to join the Police as a native detective. But, watching his opportunity, he besought Harley Greenoak to enjoin upon the four troopers on no account to let out that he had been instrumental in that, for in such event he could be of no use at all, as the vengeance of his countrymen would be certain to overtake him, and then—why, a dead man was more useless than a dead ox, since you could neither eat him nor use his skin—he added, somewhat humorously. ”

“ He was a reserved, undemonstrative man, but had taken a liking to this dare-devil youngster by reason of his pluck and adaptability.
“I don’t really see why he shouldn’t go if he’s keen on it, Chambers,” he said. “The experience will do the young dog no harm, and he seems able to take care of himself. Greenoak keeps him too much in leading-strings. Oh, that,” as the Inspector, with a dry laugh, recalled a certain adventure in Vunisa’s location which would have cost our friend his life but for the shrewdness and promptitude of Harley Greenoak. ”